Day 11 - Glacier Country cont.

The next morning (after a horrible night with sand flies filling the car and buzzing and biting all night) we left very early for Franz Josef Glacier.  We arrived at the same time as the ranger and had the entire valley to ourselves.  Way nicer than the Fox Glacier with all its bus loads of people.  And this hike was through the valley instead of next to it.  It was so quiet and peaceful.

As we were leaving, people were taking chunks of ice from the river.

The rivers at both glaciers were milky white from all the sediment ground up by the glaciers.

Large chunk of glacier

They had pictures along the way that shows where the glacier was in 2008 and how it had receded pretty far in 2012 and then more to the current position.  But the ranger told us that he was talking to a local who has lived there for a long time, and back in the 70s the glacier was actually receded further than it is now.  So it ebbs and flows every year.

Another cool fact from the ranger was about the bridge a couple of kilometers away from the glacier.  The current bridge is actually the second bridge built over the first one, because there used to be such a deep gorge under it that a plane flew under it back in the 70s.  The glacier creates so much sediment in the river, however, that it filled up the gorge and they had to build a new bridge 5 stories higher than the old one.  This is a picture of the current bridge.  Crazy, right?

From here we hauled it on the six hour drive from the west coast to Kaikoura on the east coast, driving through jade country, then gold country.  NZ had a pretty prominent gold rush and little towns popped up all over because of it.  Apparently we went through 'the town with the widest main street in New Zealand'.  It was very exciting.

Took a drive break in the town of Hokitika, where they have a Driftwood & Sand Sculpture competition every year.  That would be fun to see!

We are getting to the end of the trip.  Only a couple entries left!  Phew.